Learn the Quick Release from 3 different positions

At a young age a powerful shot with good accuracy will help you score a lot of goals, however the older you get and the more competitive the hockey gets the faster the game becomes. Soon a powerful and accurate shot is not enough, because if you wait to long to get the shot off you will never get a good scoring chance. This is where a quick release comes in.

Before we get started… A little demonstration

Before I teach the quick release I want to show you an example of a quick release. The video below has all of Steven Stamkos’ goals from the 2011 season where he popped 60 goals to win the Rocket Richard trophy. How many seconds is the puck on his stick for most of the goals?

Answer: 0.1

I know Stamkos is mostly taking one-timers, however it goes to show how important it is to get the shot off when you have the opportunity.

The key to the Quick Release

A quick release means you get the puck off quickly, without much set-up. The key to this type of shot is getting the hands away from the body and using the leverage of the stick to product power. With other shots you draw the puck back, but in this shot we need to release the puck as quick as we can. Check out the video below to learn more.

This quick release method is most helpful in the snapshot however you can use the same principle to finish your shot in the wrist shot and slapshot.

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Hi my name is Jeremy Rupke. My goal is to break every hockey skill down into easy to understand articles and videos. I explain everything step-by-step to help others improve. I'm active on Instagram, Facebook and more, you can follow through the links above.
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Great site and really helpful information. I coach youth hockey and am currently working with a 10 and under roller hockey tournament team. We have been doing well but because we travel and play in different locations we are running into inconsistancies in the level of roughness allowed in the vuesarious different tourrnaments. And by roughness i do not mean play that should be penalized but simply more contact, pushing.leaning and body contact than is allowed in our home league. My question is how do i get my team ready for the more physical level of play that we will encounter? Is there a process to use?Should we scrimmage older age divisions? Usually kids get more physical naturally as they age but we have to accelerate the process because of better tournament competition and yet I do not want to teach them bad habits or improper techniques. Thanks and looking forward to your input.

Run very competitive drills in tight areas that involve lots of puck battles. Add some type of incentive (winning team gets Gatorade, or losing team skates 5 laps and has to pull winning team) stuff like that will get them working. Playing an older age group is a good idea too

It’s all about protecting the puck and being strong on it. You need to keep the puck away from the other players sticks, and keep their sticks away from your puck. Sometimes not even handling the puck works, for example, just moving the puck out of reach, and then using your stick to knock their stick out of the way. Then gaining body position, and repositioning the puck again.

Use your legs, arms, stick and body to protect the puck. If you’ve got too many guys on you then move the puck to the weakside where one of your players should be.

I would only recommend the E28 or P14 patterns for advanced players who shoot strictly off the toe. Most NHL players do that now a days due to the velocity of the shots, but shooting from mid-heel to mid portion of the blade is far more accurate (IMO)

Another idea for a great article on shooting could be based on an idea I saw from Easton Hockey. Recently this year they made a video series about the Mako 2, their new E28 curve pattern (which I use and love), and #TheArtOfScoring. Basically their idea was that you get most of your flex in your shot off of the toe of the blade, which you can get by turning the blade over and slightly lifting the heel of the blade off the ice. It sounds confusing, and I actually had to watch the videos a few times before I fully understood, but you should check it out. It has probably saved me and has made my shot 5 mph faster.